The Case of the Missing Books

‘No, no,’ laughed Ted. ‘Don’t you be getting cute with me.’ He extended a huge open hand out of the window into the cold night air: he really had tremendous fists. ‘I’m not as green as I’m cabbage-lookin’. Let’s see the colour of your money, and I’ll be on my way. They’ll be paying you good wages at the council, unless I’m mistaken. You’re not working for free, are ye?’

‘No.’

‘Aye, well, you want to watch ‘em and make sure you’re not.’

‘OK.’

‘So, the money?’

Israel dug into his suit and duffle coat pockets and handed over all his remaining cash: £22.76. Now he was skint.

‘That’ll do rightly,’ said Ted, counting the money, before starting up his engine and heading out of the farmyard.

‘Arsehole,’ shouted Israel, in a last-minute mustering of rage and defiance as the car pulled off.

The car stopped immediately and started to reverse. Israel froze. Ted reversed neatly alongside Israel’s craven, apologetic form. His window was wound down.

‘Come again?’

‘What?’

‘Did you just say something?’

‘Me? No, no.’

‘I thought I heard you say something.’

‘No.’

‘You sure?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, you forgot these,’ said Ted, going to hand Israel his glasses out of the window.

‘Right, thanks,’ said Israel, relieved he wasn’t going to be bundled into the boot of the car and his body dumped in a river. ‘Great. Cheers.’

And as he leant down towards the window to take the glasses Ted grabbed him by the toggles on his duffle coat and pulled him close up to him.

‘If you don’t want your other eye to match the one you’ve got, you want to watch your mouth, eh.’

‘Yes,’ gasped Israel.

‘I don’t like auld dirty talk.’

‘Right. Sorry.’

‘This is a Christian country.’

‘Right.’

‘And you’d do well to remember that.’

‘Right.’

And he let Israel go. ‘There you are,’ he said, handing him his glasses.

‘Thanks,’ mumbled Israel.

‘See you tomorrow morning!’ called Ted cheerily as he pulled off in the car, orange plastic bear illuminated. ‘Nine o’clock. At the library.’

‘Right,’ said Israel. ‘Great.’

The farmyard was deserted and dark.

George had disappeared.

And Israel’s eye was swelling like a marrow in shit, and he stepped forward with his case and trod in something soft. He bent over to sniff it.

Oh, God.

It made no difference. He no longer cared.

And then he saw a light go on in a window on the dark far side of the farmyard, and he slipped and slid his way over.

A stable door opened into a whitewashed room and George was in there, wearing wellies, her high heels in one hand, a frozen choc-ice in the other; she held out the choc-ice towards Israel as he entered.

‘No, thanks,’ said Israel. ‘I couldn’t—’

‘It’s for your eye, you idiot. It’s all we have.’

‘Right. Thanks,’ said Israel, pressing the choc-ice up to his face. ‘Aaggh.’

‘You bring the yard in with you?’ said George, pointing at Israel’s manured shoes and trousers.

‘Yes. Sorry.’

George tutted and then went to leave the room.

‘Look,’ said Israel to her retreating self. ‘I’m sorry we got off to a bad start. I mean, I’m from London. I’ve met lots of people with funny names – not that George is a funny name, of course. I mean, for a woman, it’s—’

‘It’s late, Mr Armstrong.’

‘Call me Ishmael – no – Israel,’ he said, correcting himself.

She looked at him then with pity and stepped momentarily closer towards the light and Israel enjoyed his first proper one-eyed look at her. She was red-haired and bare-shouldered in her velvet evening dress, a dark green shawl slung over to keep her warm.

‘I’ll stick with Armstrong, thank you,’ she said. ‘This is you, then.’